There is a post previous to mine, and probably not the only one, that begs the question where do we go from here, using this site as a vehicle. That's exactly the reason I have come back to blogging. Many of us quiet heroes have tremendous resources that we are willing to share with our candidate. We were not in this simply to get President-elect Obama elected. So to that end I would like to make a suggestion regarding the administration. You may want to sit down.
Rumor has it that Secretary Gates may need to stay on hand for a while to help with the transition between the administrations. Considering the mess we're in, I think it's a practical idea. But why stop with Gates? Why not also keep Secretary Rice? Bush is leaving the contry in a global quagmire and whether we like it or not, Secretary Rice is as engaged in the mess as Secretary Gates. Although I was vehemently against her position heading the NSA, I must admit she has become a good Secretary of State. I also think they will work well together, because I have this sneaky suspicion they share a similar world view.
If someone out there with some juice is listening. please pass this on. I have it on good authority that the Secretary has excellent approval ratings in some of the most troubled places in the world and those people would like to complete the work she has started.
Have I got your attention? No, I am not trolling. I have already voted for Barack. In fact I have worked diligently for him since August (though my profile does not show it) and have contributed to the campaign what I could, even though I have no stable income. This is to prepare all the Obamainiacs out there for a sobering reality that came my mind two weeks ago when I stopped my daily blogging routine. The biggest word in our language is IF, which this is about, and the second is WHY, which this attempts to answer. So, why haven’t I said anything sooner? First of all I don’t believe anyone at a senior level in the campaign gives a crap about what I have to say, and second, and unfortunately more important, Barack would not have acted upon my suggestion regardless. If his losing becomes a reality and he chooses to run in the future (he will not beat Hilary in 2012 if he looses) maybe he will heed my suggestion. There are three areas that he has allowed to be misrepresented, though no surprise to any of you that they are race, foreign policy and the economy. I have a lot to say, so, unlike like others I am not going to overwhelm the default blog space with my reasoning. If you are interested in my two cents, as commanded below, click for more.
OK, everyone go into their private place, jump up and down and raise your champaign flutes to Governor Palin's come uppance. For those of us who have vetted her there is no surprise here. As I tell my friends all the time, she would have done well in Chicago style politics, maybe even taken it to another level.
Now, when you have drained the last drop of that champaign and let out your last whoop of self-righteous "I told you so", forget about it
It is time for us to totally ignore her issues and take the high road. The last thing we need is to get a fifteen yard penalty for personal foul afte the whistle blew.
The issue is the stupid economy. Be who Sarah Palin will never be.
There is a fascinating article from yesterday's Washington Post that provides a substantial history of Senator Obama's tenure in the Illinois State Senate. It's rather long, but very worthwhile. I encourage you to use it or parts of it in your literature, especially to independent and undecided voters you encounter who still say they do not know who Senator Obama is.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/08/AR2008100803890.html?wpisrc=newsletter
My Fears and Suggestions for the Economy.
I'm a little older than many in the country and my memories have a broader scope. The first time economics had any meaning to me was 1971, in the Air Force, in Germany, and President Nxon announced he was letting gold float to find it's own value on the open market and that he was going to revalue the dollar. I'm not going to dwell on the fact that gold was $36 US an ounce at the time. It is too painful. But three related occurrences stuck in my mind. The first was as the dollar began to float how fast the deutchmark gained strength. The second was that eventhough Nixon wanted the dollar to float to find its true value in international money markets many foreign nations wanted gold to remain at $36 US an ounce. The third was how American banks overseas used the floating dollar to their advantage by writing international loan payments in local currencies which were gaining strength and declaring profits based on the US dollar value of the loan at the time it was written, then dumping their own US dollars for other currencies to devalue the dollar to lower the real amount of tax they paid on profits when reported.
What I learned was those who live and die by money and stock markets, in this country we referred to as "Wall Street", will do anything and everything to manipulate those markets to insure themselves a profit, everyone else, including their own country, be damned. That is what the average American needs to understand about the fiscal crisis today.
My fear is Wall Street will respond to the current fiscal crisis which they in fact created in the most despicable way. It will drop credit and insurance stocks like a hot potato and leave the mess for the American taxpayer to clean up. Wall Street refuses to take responsibility for its failure and also refuses to be regulated, so the major players are taking their toys and playing elsewhere. Senator Frank expressed this fear the other day. His concern was whether the bailout was enough to loosen credit. Obviously it was not because Secretary Paulson and the Fed Chairman Bernanke are still trying to pull the rabbit out of the hat that will get bankers to respond. In the meantime, the market dropped below 10,000 and is still dropping today.
This brings me to my suggestion as to how the "bailout/rescue should be handled. First, as implemented it became a bailout. It solved nothing. In fact it made the situation worse because Wall Street now has proof the government will bail them out. Why else would the markets continue to fall? That is not to say something did not need to happen. The problem is the money was given directly to Wall Street which is the same as giving a bank robber money to keep the bank solvent after he just robbed it. What we needed was a revolutionary solution. The legislation passed should have provided for Federal and State governments the ability to establish credit banks and use the $850 billion to compete in mortgage and insurance markets and for business loans, while making individual taxpayers investors in the enterprise. This would force existing banking and credit entities to compete with the Federal and State banks for business while taking the concept of nationalizing the banking industry to a totally new level. Taxpayers would have a way of knowing exactly what the money was being used for and get divedend checks to boot. No major Wall Street players allowed, thank you. What a concept, investment in the financial success of our mutual futures instead of fueling the wealth and greed of the few.
Senator Obama,
Forget all the negative advertising. That dog won't hunt no more. In fact, I would completely ignore the negative attacks by McCain and Palin, and concentrate all my energy over the next three weeks on health care and the economy. That's where you are going to pick up those undecided voters, not blasting McCain. Unless they have something on you you absolutely don't want anyone to know about they can not hurt you. Anyone who is responding to McCain-Palin negativaty is not going to vote for you anyway. But you can hurt yourself by going off message. There are issues in particular I believe you need to address. First, stay on your health care plan. Second, explain why you voted for Bush's energy bill, and what you and other Democrats attempted to do to eliminate the tax break that was in it for the oil companies. Third, there is one major segment of the undecided that you must convince, the small business owner. You have to convince them because If you do not gain their confidence this election is going to be a lot closer than you want. Aside from continuing to motivate the youth, which you have been very good at, small business owners are the group that will put you over the top. Articulate how your progams will help them. I know you can do it. I heard you in Pennsylvania. Part of the change you and Deomcrats in general need to make in their approach to politics is to pull kitchen table and small business concerns under the big umbrella permantly.
And if anyone happens to ask you about Iraq and the surge, tell them what's happening in Iraq today, post suge and post Sunni awakening. And tell them what both Condy Rice and General Pateaus recently said about victory in Iraq. It's not a word they would use to describe the probable outcome. Stay strong, not negative.
Fired up, ready to go!!!
This was recently posted by me as comment to a John Friedman article on the CBS news web site entitled "The Sarah Palin Phenomenon Is Doomed". While he may be correct in his surmise that she is simply new, and will become boring, I would prefer her ignomany to be from revelation of the truth. They only provide 1500 character responses so this is kind of choppy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URIypadX3n0
No Troopergate, foreign policy or experience questions. These reveal real Sarah Palin.
I keep saying I'm going to stay above the fray, but this is just too good. These are the Alaskan hockey moms that know Sarah Palin. Why isn't any of the really bad stuff making it to the cable media
I saw this happening durint McCain's acceptance speech. First he steals Obama's tag line, then he starts using parts of his economic recovery plan like it is his own. I got an email from McCain08 this morning begging for a minimum $50 campaign donation he wants to use to defray administrative costs. They also had the obligatory comment allowing me to remove myself from their mailing list. What they also did was allow me to comment on why I was or was not giving a donation. Boy, did they get an earful from me. I won't post on this page what I said (I was not profane). But I will summarize. Basically I let them know that Obama supporters know he has compromised his honor to try to win an election and he was trying to steal Obama's them and economic recovery message because he has none of his own. Then I told him we all know Palin is a lying hypocrite and he ought to be ashamed of himself for running such a dishonest campaign.
The message we need to understand is that neither we nor Obama can allow these guys to steal the message like they thought of it first. Obama must shout this dishonesty from every campaign podium, in every debate, until November 3, or until McCain stops.
They got my name because I was trolling there. If you get one make sure you let them know what you think.
From everything I have heard over the last two weeks I am getting depressed. The odds of winning this thing are not governed by who has the better plan or because of racism. This election will be decided by the percentage of the voting public that is irreversibly stupid. I have heard too many voters say the only thing they're interested in is the professed religious values of the candidate, the economy be damned. They want a democratic theocracy. It explains the losses of Gore and Kerry more than any other factor. Of course Obama being African American doesn't help. To many he will never be one of them. They're the kind of people who prefer to drown than acknowledge the (Black) hand of God has been sent to save them. It is also what keeps the Republicans from selecting a pro-choice presidential candidate, or a Mormon or a Jew or an Asian for that matter, regardless their qualifications. Minorities can join, they can even help, but they will never rule.
The real problem of course is their incompetence to govern, to manage which they claim is their strength, or to keep us out of war because guns is the way out of recession when the butter melts, so they say. It is no coincidence that Black Monday happened on Reagan's watch. It is no coindence that the housing market first fell apart under H.W. It is no surprise the wheels are completely off the bus under W. In economics we call it the law of diminishing returns. There is no doubt in my mind it will take longer to recover under McCain than it will under Obama, if McCain could ever get on the right track. That's how different the ideologies are.
So I have a solution. It's time to split the country between those wanting a more liberal or socially conscious government and those who choose christian fundamentalist based conservatism. Something like Pakistan. Let's suspend the geographical implausibilities of such a plan for the moment and only consider the fiscal and political opportunities.
Over the next four years each government would collect its own taxes, structure its own economy, prioritize its own issues, and establish its own foreign policy and alliances. We would also have to have a non-agression pact against each other, which I doubt they would honor. So we would have to have a very capable military. The only thing the competitiors would have in common is the constitution, at least to start with. After four years the progress of each government could be evaluated to prove without a doubt which ideology is better for the USA. Then the more successful government could opt to allow the less successful to rejoin, or leave them forever to their own devices. My advice is if the Democrats prove more capable (which I inherently believe or else I'd be supporting McCain) leave the fools to their own devices. All they would do in their stubborness is try to ruin us in their jealousy. Not very Christian of them, huh?
I've been on ireport most of the afternoon having fun shutting down dumb rebumblecans. I actually ended four conversations. Then I turned to the one below from Alaskans.
http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-87253
I said I wouldn't talk about Palin anymore, but this was too juicy to pass up. I have no idea if it's true, but I had to LOL when I read this comment:
"She sucks at being a mom too. According to Frontierman paper , Trach destroyed school buses. Friends of his posted on my space that he is addicted to cocaine and oxycontin. He was forces into joining the military so he would straighten himself out. Bristol drinks and slept around. The baby's daddy dropped out of High School. God knows what the other three will be capable of doing in the Whitehouse. She needs to stop thinking of herself and think of her kids"
I've said it before and I'll say it again. In the United States, No one individual, no group of people bonded together in common cause, including and in particularly the founding fathers who we so often look to for answers, has ever accomplished anything without a fight. Regardless how honorable Senator Obama wants to be, people are waiting for him to start winning the fight. We like you, we believe in you, we are ready to follow you to the cave where Osama bin Ladin lives.
This morning on "This Week" the round table offered a gem that makes a lot of sense. The way to beat John McCain is first stop talking about Sarah Palin, which I have advocated from the beginning, and second, attack John McCain's strength, his honor. I've been watching the View to see the ladies gang up on Elisabeth Hasselbeck over Palin, and Friday, when Big John was on, I thought Barbara Walters was playing "whack-a-mole" on his honor questioning the negative and dishonest ads he has been running. And she didn't miss a whack. At one moment he almost exploded. I nearly came out of my seat in delighted surprise. And then Whoppi whacked his honor when he affirmed his adherance to strict interpretation of the constitution, reminding him that it once advocated slavery and if he meant she would have to go back to being a slave under his administration. Stepped right in it he did.
The bottom line is this, and we all know it. John McCain 2008 is not the same as John McCain 2000, when he was an honorable man most Democrats respected. That is where the emphasis belongs. Your ads should ask him like a wounded puppy why his ads are full of lies, then enumerate the lies next to the truth asking why each time, instead of simply pointing out the lie. Say what an honorable man he used to be. Ask him why he approves messages he knows are not the truth. Then end it by asking him to just talk about the issues.
I also have my own why question. Why does Jon Daly do a better job of campaigning for you than your own campaign?
The thought occurred to me that if Obama wins, regardless what fire and brimstone fundamentalist and men who think Palin is hot (get a life, please) and women who just want a woman, any woman regardless of capability on any ticket (cause she's as incompetent as them), and bigots who would not vote for Obama because of cultural hatred, he's still going to fix the economy and show them the way to a better life.
But if McCain wins, we get four more years of George Bush, with Sarah Palin on the side.
With no disrespect meant to the millions of people in Texas, Louisianna,Florida and Mississippi over the past couple of weeks by Hurricanes, there is no way I can pass this up.
The following is a conversation that may be happening between Big Oil and Big Bad John right now.
Big John: "Drill, baby drill and drill now!" China hi-jacked our Iraqi oil. We have absolutely nothing to show for our invasion of Iraq."
Oil Exec: "Drill? We can't even pump this hurricane's so bad."
Big John: "You got to do something. Tell the Governor to call up the Guard, the seebees to do something."
Oil Exec: "We can't sir, most of the Guard is deployed in Iraq and what's left has been ordered to search and rescue hurricane victims."
Meanwhile, CNN reports that in Florida oil prices all of a sudden jumped 50 cent while people waited in line to fill up.
By the time they get this oil mess stablized in seven years we should already be 85% of the way to energy independence and free from the yoke oil and fewer national security issues.
In the meantime, let us all pray for the victims of our latest national emergency.
There is an interesting article in Politico that provides a hypothetical scenario of what was said in a closed meeting between the ex-President and the Presidential campaigner. Like most articles of this type it offers some interesting ideas regardidng how much more success an Obama campaign might be if it took Bill's advice to be more like his campaign. Read it if you want.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0908/13394.html
The last suggestion I take exception to, whether Bill feels it, or Hillary feels it, or the press feels it, or anybody else. That is that Barack Obama should apologize to him and stand up for him as not being a racist. I like Bill. I voted for him twice. I forgave him for his indescretions. Lord knows I'm guilty of my own. And I do not think you or Hillary are racist at the core. I do believe that like the McCain campaign you are not above doing or saying whatever to win an election. But there is one thing white people in general have to realize. When you say something the majority of black folks determine is full of denigrating insinuation, it is you who owes the apology, and I believe most of my black brothers and sisters out there will agree with what I am about to say. In fact I believe any practical person will agree.
When a well-meaning person makes a statement that an entire group of well-meaning people find offensive, the person that made the statement is responsible for his or her own soul searching, and must decide what to do next. I guess you can say there are three choices: move on and let the whole thing blow over with time, remain sore and insist people are wrong to take what you said the wrong way, or apologize for saying something everyone understands was a misstatement but admit the statement may have been insensitive. There is a fourth, continue saying the same thing over and over and over, but we don't need to go there this time.
On the other hand, if Barack apologized for Bill, you have no idea what a lot of Black people would have to say about that. But I do. White people who make remarks that a major portion of the Black population believes holds racist connotation do not get to decide whether the statement was racist. The Black folks are the ones who are offended, not the White folks. Man up and move on. You'll be forgiven if we like you. And there is no doubt in my mind that Black people genuinely like Bill and Hillary. I further submit if either one of them had owned the inappropriateness of their statements during the primaries, it just might be Hillary sitting in the cat bird seat wondering how to deal with the latest attack from the Republican's now perfected negativity attack machine. Her detractors number as many, if not more than Barack's. It's just a different demographic. And if Barack had picked Hillary to run with him as VP, you have no idea what that negativity attack machine would have done. But I do. I'm alright with the fact that an ex-President may think he is above apology, and I believe most of my Black brothers and sisters are too. Some of just need a little more time heal, that's all. So stop picking at the sore.
